The Financial Impact of Decreased Milk Production Due to Subclinical Mastitis in German Dairy Herds

Year 2017, , 110 - 115, 20.06.2017

Martin Pfützner László ózsvárı

https://doi.org/10.16988/iuvfd.322545

Abstract

The mastitis has been
identified as the most costly disease in dairy industry. The aim of this study
was performed to provide adequate information on the financial loss due to
subclinical mastitis in German dairy farms. The data were collected from 12
dairy farms (a total of 7,648 Holstein-Friesian dairy cows) in the Elbe-Elster
region, Germany. Their milk composition data were gathered individually once in
a month from June 2011 to June 2012. Herde® (Agrosoft GmbH, Germany), a herd
management program was used to analyse the data from the economic point of
view. The 50,000 somatic cell counts (SCC)/mL of a cut-off value was used to
calculate the decrease in milk production emerged in subclinical mastitis.
Average figures on an individual basis showed a daily decrease in milk
production of 2.98 kg, 5.41 kg and 6.41 kg for cows with 50,001-100,000 SCC/mL,
100,001-250,000 SCC/mL and over 250,000 SCC/mL, respectively. All the
reductions in milk yield were statistically significant by using mixed effect
ANOVA and Tukey’s multiple comparison method. Based on the average milk price
in the survey period, a single cow according to the aforementioned SCC classification
showed a loss of Euro (€) 294.85, € 536.80 and € 634.40 per lactation in gross
milk receipts, respectively. On an average herd level, which was 637 dairy cows
in this study, a total decrease of gross milk receipts was calculated to be
almost € 241,000 per year. This findings show that the milk production begins
to reduce over 50,000 SCC/mL, therefore the generally accepted cut-off value of
100,000 SCC/mL for subclinical mastitis should be re-evaluated.

Keywords

Daily milk yield, Financial loss, Germany, subclinical mastitis, SCC

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